Center-Shinui Movement

   A political bloc made up of three political parties: Shinui, the Independent Liberals, and the Liberal Center. Shinui was formed in 1974 by Tel Aviv University law professor Amnon Rubinstein. In 1976, it joined with other groups to form the Democratic Movement for Change (DMC), a centrist party headed by Yigael Yadin that won 15 seats in the 1977 Knesset election. With the demise of the DMC, Shinui set out on its own, winning two seats in 1981 and three in 1984. It was a junior partner in the 1984-88 Government of National Unity. It joined with the

   Independent Liberal and Liberal Center Parties to form the Center-Shinui Movement and won two seats in the 1988 election.

   In 1988, it campaigned on a platform that claimed it was the only political body combining an aspiration for peace based on compromise, a socioeconomic concept encouraging a free and enterprising economy, the protection of individual rights, and opposition to religious coercion. It claimed that it would not join a coalition government formed by the Likud and the religious parties. It also differed from the Alignment in its approach to the economy and focused on a free-market economy encouraging growth and creativity rather than the failed bureaucratic approaches of the Labor-Alignment. In the political realm, the movement favored a peace agreement with the Arabs, arguing that this would free Israel from the cycle of war and bloodshed and prevent it from becoming a binational state that would rule over another people. Such a peace agreement would be based on the principle of land for peace. Israel's security would be guaranteed by secure border adjustments, security arrangements, and the demilitarization of evacuated areas.

   In 1992, the Center-Shinui Movement joined with two other left-wing Zionist parties (Citizens' Rights and Peace Movement and Mapam) to form the Meretz/Democratic Israel coalition that won 12 seats in the 13th Knesset and participated in the Labor-led coalition governments in the 1990s headed by Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres. However, Shinui split from Meretz to run independently for election to the 15th Knesset in 1999, while in March 2004, Meretz refashioned itself as Yahad-Social Democratic Israel under the leadership of former Labor member of the Knesset and government minister Joseph (Yossi) Beilin.